


Analysis of a Shadow

by yuji2000



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Existential Crisis, Fate Worse Than Death, Gen, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-14
Updated: 2019-09-14
Packaged: 2020-10-17 15:20:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20623208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuji2000/pseuds/yuji2000
Summary: "I need only bend over that dark mirror to behold my own image, now completely resembling him, my brother, my master."





	Analysis of a Shadow

**Author's Note:**

> This story was inspired by Hermann Hesse's "Demian", one of my favourite novels, which is quoted here a few times. It is also inspired by the song "Evelyn, Evelyn", which is indirectly quoted too.

_"He said something that disturbed me once. That we were alike. I know it doesn't mean anything, but, sometimes I wonder if he'll always be there. In the shadows of my reflection..."_

* * *

  
In the immediate aftermath of the Battle of Hogwarts, he buried the Elder Wand somewhere where he was sure no one would ever suspect: Number 4 Privet Drive. Hermione cast a few spells to make it unrecoverable. And as good measure, the Fidelius Charm was cast, with Ron as the Secret Keeper.

Harry felt surprisingly happy. Warm. Relieved. Triumphant. It was over.

* * *

  
In the following days, the ruins of the castle became more depressing to look at. A positively Gothic scene, complete with dismal weather and the sounds of echoing footsteps and children crying in the Great Hall. Some of the bodies were pristine, clear victims of the Killing Curse. Others were mangled and disfigured. There was only one way to identify them. Almost nothing could've made Harry hate himself more than making an eleven year old child look at the face of a corpse and ask them if this was their best friend.

* * *

  
It was inevitable. He had braced himself for this moment. The time the nightmares arrived.

However, he expected them to be about the Battle. Instead, in his first nightmare since the event, he was twelve years old again and holding the sword of Godric Gryffindor. This place was dark and smelled of stale water. The soles of his shoes were getting unpleasantly soggy as he jogged through the flooded Chamber of Secrets, as a voice called out to him.

"I can see now," the voice hissed. "There is nothing special about you, after all."

The tail of the basilisk swerved into Harry's chest, though somehow his matchstick arms kept a hold of the sword.

"I wondered, you see," Tom Riddle continued. "There are strange likenesses between us, after all. Even you must have noticed. Both halfbloods, orphans, raised by Muggles. We even look something alike."

In this dream, the basilisk swallows him alive.

Harry woke up with a jolt. He was blushing and sweating feverishly, and the room seemed far too hot. Ron must've heard him, as he sat up gingerly and asked, "Harry?"

Before he could continue, Harry bolted out of the room and into the nearest bathroom. Ginny was just stepping out of her morning shower and screamed as he opened the door. He took no notice as she frantically covered herself with the towel. He turned on the tap and splashed frigid cold water onto his face, until his bangs were wet and dripping.

"Bad dream, was it?" asked Ginny, now with clothes over her damp skin.

"Yeah," replied Harry, staring at his reflection. His scar hurt until it felt like his head was about to burst, but he knew that it could not mean anything. It was merely a phantom pain.

* * *

  
_"Can you forgive me?" Dumbledore asked. "Can you forgive me for not trusting you? For not telling you?"_

* * *

  
Harry could only take the Potion for Dreamless Sleep for so long. It could apparently make you sleep forever if you took too much of it, and Hermione and Ron were only getting more concerned that he would with each passing day.

So a week after the first nightmare, he went to sleep without the draught.

It wasn't very easy. His scar tingled. And yes, he knew it was nothing, but he couldn't help his instincts to be on high alert whenever it happened. Eventually, though, he stopped tossing and turning and exhausted himself into a deep sleep.

This dream was not particularly pleasant, but if it was a nightmare, he felt it was not his. He was far shorter in this one. Harry couldn't remember being this short. He crept out of a bed he'd never seen before, feeling distinctly cold and hungry. His stomach cramped as he unlocked the door to the hallway.

"Go back to bed," said a quiet but stern female voice. Harry turned around to see a tired looking woman, in a long dress and an apron.

"Matron," he said. "I want food."

"There is no more."

"Why?"

"Well, times have been rough for a few years, we simply can't get any."

"I want food. I'm hungry."

"You think you're the only kid that feels that way? Now back to bed."

"Matron," he began again. "Can you tell me the story about my parents?"

"Tom, we simply didn't know enough about them. A woman came in and gave birth to you, then she died from losing blood. She named you after your father and her father. That's all we know. Now back to your dorm before I give you a spanking."

Harry woke up in a sweat again. He made sure to avoid Ginny in the bathroom.

* * *

  
Sometimes Harry heard a faint voice, scratching at the back of his skull, finishing his sentences and answering his questions. "What shall we wear tonight? What shall we eat today?" They talked about so many things. Sometimes he woke up first to hear this voice sleeping. Sometimes he thought he was going insane. He knew who this voice was but dared not admit it to himself.

* * *

  
And so he continued to dream of Riddle's memories. The murders, the Horcruxes, the screams, and the dying. Including the murder of his parents. He had seen these memories through another perspective in Dumbledore's Pensieve and had glimpses of them before. Now he had them from Voldemort's point of view, but it made no difference to the completeness of his knowledge. The tale of Tom Riddle's misdemeanours had been recounted so many times now that he'd become numb to it.

The most frightening dream Harry had was not one where he was Riddle. It was the ones where Riddle was him.

1995\. Or was it 1996? It was after Sirius' death. He was staring at the carpet in Dumbledore's office.

"I know how you are feeling, Tom."

"No, you don't."

"There is no shame in what you are feeling, Riddle. The ability to feel pain is a human's greatest strength."

"My greatest strength, is it?" he replied shakily with a sneer, pacing around the office. "You haven't got a clue. You don't know..."

"What don't I know?" Dumbledore asked.

Riddle paused. "I don't want to talk about how I feel, alright?"

"Tom, suffering like this proves you are still a man! This pain is part of being human!"

"THEN I DON'T WANT TO BE HUMAN!"

* * *

  
_"Abraxas was the god who was both god and devil, he had elements of good and bad. For this god could not reach ultimate power while being absolutely good."_  
_\- Hermann Hesse, Demian_

* * *

  
Third year DADA class. Lupin opened the closet with the Boggart inside.

Riddle sees his own corpse.

Classmates giggle. They do not understand what they see. "What is your fear, Tom? Is it sleep? Are you sleeping? Why is the Boggart of you sleeping?"

Riddle screams in a mixture of rage and horror.

"Now, now," Lupin says calmly. "Think of how you can make this funny. Then cast it - Riddikulus!"

Riddle blows up the closet instead.

* * *

  
In another dream, Harry returns home at Privet Drive, not knowing whether he's Riddle or himself in this one. He opens the door and finds his answer.

The interior is not of Privet Drive. It's of a place he's never seen before. He walks as quietly as he can to the living room. There's a man sitting in an armchair, in a smart suit, reading a book while the radio is playing. The announcer is saying something about the blitz and the possibility of a German invasion.

The man in the armchair turns around to look at Harry.

"Who are you?"

"Your son," he replies.

"I never had a son," the man says, getting up and walking towards him. "Get out before I call the cops-"

The older man pauses, looking at the younger man, before mouthing a "no."

"No?" Riddle replies. His mouth twitches slightly, as some long buried feelings threatened to break their floodgates. Riddle swallowed. "Gaunt. Merope Gaunt. Does that ring a bell?"

The man shakes his head in shock, his face having drained of colour. He trembles as he inspects every detail of his son's face. Though no trace of Gaunt remains, there is no doubt, the boy is telling the truth. Harry can almost hear his thoughts. _I didn't think she was being honest... If I had known... Whatever happened to that woman that her son would need to visit me..._

Riddle takes out his wand and then it's all over.

* * *

  
_"We are so very close," Harry began._

_"A parasite needs a host," Riddle finished._

* * *

  
"What do you mean my mother was the witch?"

"Exactly what I mean, boy."

"But she died."

"Witches and wizards can die, boy."

"But she died of a simply haemorrhage after I was born. Couldn't she have fixed it with magic?"

"Then I'm very sorry, boy."

"Why didn't she fix it!?" the young Riddle yelled, his voice breaking.

"I'm sorry."

* * *

  
_"PLEASE JUST GET OUT OF MY HEAD! NO, NO, ANYTHING BUT THIS, PLEASE! I NEVER ASKED FOR THIS, I NEVER WANTED THIS, ALL I WANT IS SOME TIME TO MYSELF!"_

* * *

  
How many times had he seen this one? Harry winced as Voldemort cast the Killing Curse on his mother. Now he understood it in full, why Voldemort could not comprehend the reasoning of sacrificial love.

* * *

  
He had trapped Voldemort in Limbo where he could not revive or pass on or come back as a ghost. There he was again, with Dumbledore by his side.

"Is this real?" Harry asked. "Or is this just inside my head?"

"It might be inside your head, but why on earth should that mean that it isn't real?"

Harry's face turned white. If Limbo is inside his head, and he trapped Voldemort in Limbo, then-

"Can you forgive me?" Dumbledore asked. "Can you forgive me for not trusting you? For not telling you?"

* * *

  
_"I need only bend over that dark mirror to behold my own image, now completely resembling him, my brother, my master."_  
_\- Hermann Hesse, Demian._

**Author's Note:**

> I finished reading the Harry Potter series only a few days ago, and adopted Voldemort as my favourite character. This fanfiction is kind of a study of him. I am fascinated by him because he angers and disgusts me, but also charms and attracts me, and most of all, I am terrified of him. I sympathise deeply with him and see myself in him, which only repulses me more.
> 
> I believe Riddle was troubled by being orphaned and raised in an orphanage during the Great Depression and World War 2, where he might have been impoverished, and possibly because he inherited a vulnerability for mental illness from the Gaunt side of his family. I also believe Riddle was not incapable of love, but chose not to feel it. He missed his mother and father, but was cut that his father never looked for him and that his mother chose death over living to raise him. He regarded his mother's choice as weakness and developed his signature thanatophobia. However, Riddle would've never admitted this, even to himself, and his vice was the pride to think he could be without weakness, whereas Harry accepts death and the grief of separation without letting it destroy him.
> 
> This fanfiction can be interpreted many ways. Is this all just a result of Harry's PTSD? Or is Voldemort still somehow trapped inside him? And would Dumbledore have known that this would be the result? It's up to you, reader.


End file.
